"I will be King no more!" he said. "I will be nothing but your lover, and forget everything in that joy. I will die happy, and not eaten up with the cares of a throne."
The tone in which he spoke, the fire that blazed in eyes, just now so dull, instead of pleasing Marie, gave her a terrible pang; at that moment she blamed her love for contributing to the illness of which the King was dying.
"You forget your prisoners," said she, starting up suddenly.
"What do I care about the men? They have my permission to kill me."
"What? Assassins!" said she.
"Do not be uneasy, we have them safe, dear child.—Now, think not of them, but of me. Say, do you not love me?"
"Sire!" she cried.
"Sire!" he repeated, flashing sparks from his eyes, so violent was his first surge of fury at his mistress' ill-timed deference. "You are in collusion with my mother."
"Great God!" cried Marie, turning to the picture over her praying-chair, and trying to get to it to put up a prayer. "Oh! make him understand me!"
"What!" said the King sternly. "Have you any sin on your soul?"